Giant penguin hoax

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In the 1940s, Florida residents reported giant penguin-like sightings and three-toed tracks along places like Clearwater Beach and the Suwannee River. A description spread of a 15-foot-tall penguin with alligator-like feet, seen from land, on the water, and even from an airplane. These stories were picked up by newspapers and discussed by cryptozoologist Ivan T. Sanderson, who speculated the creature might be a penguin displaced from its habitat.

In 1988, reporter Jan Kirby revealed the hoax. It was cooked up by Tony Signorini and Al Williams, who admitted to making iron penguin feet to create the fake tracks. The whole episode shows that there is no evidence of living giant penguins; while giant penguins did exist as fossils, they lived millions of years ago in the Southern Hemisphere and are now extinct. The idea of giant penguins has also appeared in fiction, such as Jules Verne's Journey to the Center of the Earth and H. P. Lovecraft's At the Mountains of Madness. The story was later parodied in a Modern Family episode, where a character’s father is revealed to have fabricated the footprints.